


Day 16: Past present and future

by TT40_Angst_Queen



Series: My NCIS Holiday Themes 2017 [16]
Category: NCIS
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Bashing, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Rape/Non-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 09:39:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13028325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TT40_Angst_Queen/pseuds/TT40_Angst_Queen
Summary: The past is sometimes more painful then the idea of your future, but it's the present that starts the healing to get there.- Me





	Day 16: Past present and future

**Dec 24th, 1999 Baltimore, Maryland**

 

It was the knock on the door that made Anthony DiNozzo look up from his attempt at unsticking the frozen TV dinner from the back of the otherwise empty old freezer. He wasn’t expecting anyone, and since he was only hired a week ago by the Navy Cop, Leroy Jethro Gibbs (and really, did the man's parents hate him or something? How much hillbilly could you put in one name alone?) he wasn’t expected, let alone late for work. The woman in HR, the one that helped him fill out his paperwork to get hired, had told him that Gibbs had a habit of showing up at his team members door when they were late. Not to mention he didn’t think Gibbs even knew where he lived. But then again, Tony’s address could be easily found, it was one of the things he had been told to write down for his personnel file, even though he would be moving when he eventually found an apartment in DC. 

 

Tony’s breath fogged and he shivered as he made his way to the door, where the person was still knocking, clearly impatient. The heating in his apartment was broken, and the landlord had told him he was working on it, but that had been a month ago, and Tony doubted the man was doing a goddamned thing. The rat-faced bastard hated him, after all. It didn’t help that he had hit on the woman that the rat held a torch for. 

Opening the door, he just about got punched in the face as the person went to pound on the door, but Tony ducked in time, feeling the air ruffle his hair from the force of the ‘swing’. 

 

“Finally, DiNozzo, what the hell took you so long?” Tony stared incredulously at his new boss, and he stared for a moment, while the man just raised an eyebrow, waiting for a reply.

 

“Well?” Tony snapped out of his funk, and picked up his jaw, dusting it off for good measure, and raised his own eyebrow back at the man.

 

“I was getting dinner, Boss,” Tony replied, leaning against the doorway. “What the hell are  _ you _ doing here? Did you look in my file, find out where I live? Never mind, don’t answer that. But really, what the hell?”

 

Gibbs just smirked, making Tony want to scowl, but found himself smirking back for reasons he couldn’t figure out.

 

“Let me guess- TV dinner?” 

 

“How did you-” Tony gapped, and Gibbs just shrugged.

 

“I know your type, DiNozzo,” Gibbs chuckled. “So TV dinner, Christmas specials on the idiot box, all alone?” 

 

“Yeah, sounds about right.” Tony muttered, reluctantly. 

 

“Nah,” Gibbs drawled. “How do ya’ like your steak?” Tony blinked at the non-sequitur, and uncrossed his arms.

 

“Uh, rare?” Tony said, the statement more like a question as it left his mouth.

 

“Good, get your coat, you’re comin’ to my place for tonight and tomorrow.” Tony felt himself reach for his shoes, his coat and scarf already on thanks to his damn heating problem, and followed his new Boss out the door. 

 

“Hope you like sweets, Abby made her famous lab-baked Christmas cookies and stuffing,” Tony hurried after the man, his brain catching on to what Gibbs just said.

 

“Hold on- did you just say  _ lab-baked _ ?”

 

**Dec 24th 2017 Washington, DC**

 

Tony unloaded the last of the groceries into the freezer. He had just finished unpacking the last of the Christmas stuff, things that he and Tali had saw and liked on their travels through France, Israel, and most of Europe. After two years of traveling, Tony had decided it was time that his daughter got to settle in one place, rather than be dragged all over the globe. 

 

Even two years of watching the now five year old little girl grow, looking more and more like him and less like Ziva, with her green eyes and light brown honey curls, Tony couldn't believe he actually had a daughter, sometimes. He remembered the night that she would have been conceived on, and found himself saddened and angry that while he loved his daughter and would never want to give her up for anything, he wished that she hadn't been made while he was drunk off his ass and Ziva had clearly taken advantage of it. 

 

He had blurry memories of the coupling, and remembered that at the time, it wasn't dark hair and even darker eyes that he had been seeing in his intoxicated mind, but silver hair and bright blue eyes. He clearly remembered crying out Gibbs’ name more than a few times that night, and Ziva, who Tony  _ knew _ was stone cold sober that night, should have realized that he was in no state to really provide complete consent. He had only gone after Ziva to find her because while she had treated him horribly in the last few years before she died, he thought that those moments of softness he had seen in her expression at times showed that she could be a better person if she had time to heal, and reflect now that her father was gone and she was away from Mossad and its influence. 

 

He was wrong, clearly. 

 

Because what she had done that night was testament to rape. And he loved his daughter, and knew she wasn't at all to blame for her mother's actions. How was he supposed to explain to her when she was older, that the girls mother had forced herself into Tali’s father, and the result was her birth? She wouldn't remember her mother by then-hell, she didn't really remember her now- but he knew that while she wouldn't remember, knowing that you were the result of something so violating-it was devastating. Tony had seen it plenty of times when he was a cop, and again when he was a federal agent. Now, working as a consultant for multiple agencies-excluding the CIA, because he still didn’t trust them- he saw it occasionally there too. 

 

Tony wished that he still had the support of his NCIS family to lean on, the way he did before things started to go to shit. It was Christmas eve, and Tali was sleeping like a rock, something she got got from him, and wouldn’t wake until morning, barring any nightmares, which rarely happened.  Tony missed the days when he would go to Gibbs’ for Christmas eve and the morning after, and they would eat steak, drink cheap eggnog, and eat whatever Christmas themed goodies that Abby had cooked up in her lab. Those days were long gone, and Tony knew that it had been for longer than he had been gone from NCIS. Gibbs and him…. There was a lot of pent up anger and resentment that Tony still felt. But somehow, he still loved the man, deeply.  

 

The knocking of the door made him flinch as he placed the last item in the freezer, deja vu making him frown as he remembered a similar situation eighteen years ago. 

 

He made his way towards the door, this time comfortably warm in sweats, and a sweater stained with a red and blue paint handprints, and glitter in his hair from the days Christmas activities. Tali  _ loved _ glitter. Tony was beginning to hate it with a passion, but he would deal, just to make his baby girl happy. 

 

Opening the door, he was both surprised and not to see Gibbs standing there, hand posed to knock again, this time thankfully not almost punching him in the face. Tony observed the mans face, noticing that the man looked older, more worn then when Tony had left two years before. Gibbs had always looked older than he actually was-a life of stress, loss, and injuries sustained both in the corps, and in his job made sure of that- but as Tony took stock of a man he hadn’t seen in a couple of years, he saw that the man looked even older, even having only turning fifty-two this year, a full eight years older then Tony himself. The once silver hair was snow white, and the once tanned skin was pale and filled with wrinkles, bright blue eyes dulled and paled with age, no longer holding the sparkle they once held. 

 

He looked like an old man, and yet, Tony still loved him. 

 

Even if he was still angry.

 

“Do I have to hurt McGee for tracking my phone, Gibbs?” Tony spoke, the several minutes of silence that they had taken to observe one another. Another thing that had clearly changed in the older man- the old Gibbs would have barged in and began growling at him, demanding an explanation for dropping almost completely off the map, even if he kept his old phone on, knowing that the team would want to at least know he was safe. 

 

“Nah,” God, even Gibbs’ voice sounded aged; rough and gravely, strained and thin. “Taught myself how ta’ track yer’ phone, DiNo- Tony.” Tony raised an eyebrow in surprise; so the luddite had converted, had he?

“I see,” Tony muttered, and opened the door further, ushering Gibbs in, noticing that the man walked slower then before, and his shoulders were slumped, unsure and cautious. 

 

“Sit, I’ll get you a coffee.” Tony went to get one, but he saw Gibbs shake his head. 

 

“Nah, I, uh, just had one a couple hours ago,” Tony saw Gibbs’ pale cheeks pink a bit. “My Doc’ is makin’ me cut down, says that my blood pressure is too high, cos’ of my diet,” Gibbs laughed. It wasn’t a happy sound. “He’s got me seein’ this shrink, too. She’s uh, she’s somethin’ else, a real spitfire, kinda’ reminds me of,” Gibbs gulped, “-of Shannon. Doesn’t take any of my crap.” Tony sat in the seat across from Gibbs as the man spoke, the blue-eyed ex-marine staring into his hands that twisted together nervously. 

 

Tony watched and listened as the man spoke, noticing his shoulders never released themselves from their hunched and tense position. The man never stopped looking at his hands, and his hesitant, almost stuttering words made Tony realise that Gibbs had changed even more then he thought. The confidence the man once had around Tony was gone, in its place was a man who seemed terrified and-as Tony looked at how Gibbs held himself tense and close to the door, the only exit- most likely expecting to be hit. The man that sat in his living room was so unlike the man that he had left to run the team without him two years ago, that Tony honestly wondered if the person sitting on his worn leather couch wasn’t a complete stranger, and not Leroy Jethro Gibbs, hardass toughened Marine. 

 

“Why are you here, Jethro?” Tony asked, his voice quiet, but firm. The older man looked up, and Tony flinched at the raw  _ agony  _ in the man’s eyes.

 

“I’m  _ so _ sorry, Tony,” Gibbs choked, and Tony was even more shocked to see tears in the man’s eyes, and start to roll down the weathered, pale cheeks. “I’m sorry for what I did to you, how I treated you,” Gibbs hitched a breath, and Tony resisted the urge to comfort the man, and just watched the uncharacteristic behaviour with a blank face that he found harder and harder to keep up.

 

“I will never forgive myself for how I treated you before you left, and I don’t blame you if you can never forgive me for it,” Gibbs shivered, and Tony noticed the man had lost a significant amount of weight. Gibbs clearly was not in peak condition. He actually looked like he would blow over in a stiff wind. “I never meant to hurt you. My anger at you after I got shot in Iraq was unreasonable, and I know I shouldn’t have benched you all the time, and I shouldn’t have ignored you or when I didn’t ignore you, I was a bastard to you, even worse then usual. I-” Gibbs shook his head, tears still rolling down his face, his eyes now red and puffy. It was the last straw for Tony, and while still angry at Gibbs, he felt it abiding some in the face of the man’s clearly honest remorse. The man had clearly suffered since he left, and guilt seemed to have sucked the life out of the once strong and confident Marine.  Tony walked over to the couch and settled beside the crying man, putting an arm around Gibbs’ shoulders, and pulling him into his side, letting the man sob into his chest for almost half an hour before it slowly tapered off. The older man wasn’t asleep, but seemed more relaxed then before. 

 

“It started long before Iraq, Jethro, you know that, right?” Tony whispered, combing his hands through the man’s hair, ignoring how this was completely out of character for both of them. Or maybe it wasn’t, it  _ had _ been two years, and clearly, Gibbs was a changed man. All the masks and walls and anger seemed to be completely gone from the man, leaving a open, festering nerve, filled with pain, guilt, regret and sadness. 

 

Jethro nodded into his chest, his breath hitching for a moment. “I know, Tony.” Gibbs breathed, and Tony rested his cheek on the white hair, stroking a hand down Jethro’s back, his heart lurching as he felt each bone in the man’s spine, and each of the man's ribs, even through his coat. 

 

“It started when Kate got here, little things, like ignoring when she went too far with her remarks. As much as I loved her, she could be and was quite cruel at times with her comments. Sometimes you would say something, reprimand her, but most of the time you let her get away with saying stuff that you had never let any of the other probies, even Viv, get away with saying. A lot of what she said hurt, and if I was anyone else, I would have probably made a formal complaint, maybe even quit. I knew that she honestly didn’t think what she was doing was wrong, though; Kate had grown up with three older brothers, she had learned to fight dirty, verbally and physically. I really couldn’t believe it though, when you let her get away with kicking Tim in the nuts that time. You made her think it was ok, when you just told him that he shoulda worn a cup. Kate really could have injured Tim, a number of medical problems can pop up from that, and I was surprised that Tim wasn’t more injured then he was.” 

 

Tony though back to that day, and remembered that when the case was over, he had gone over to McGee’s apartment, finding him nursing his groin with a pack of ice. 

 

“We still spent time together, and you still treated me fine when we did, just you and me. Kate died, and you went after Ari, and you treated us like crap. Then Ziva was hired, and I don’t know what she said to you to make you trust her so instantly, other then killing Ari. I’m guessing she tripped your paternal instincts, shed a few tears about killing her brother, and told you a sob story about her father.” Tony sighed, and Gibbs nodded jerkily into his chest, confirming his guess. Tony squeezed the thin shoulders in his arms, and he felt his chest tighten when the man snuggled slightly into his hold. “She played us from the beginning, Jethro. I noticed it from the moment she didn’t invite me to the team dinner,” Tony felt Gibbs tense in his arms, he kept running his hands soothingly down his back. 

 

“I know she told you, Jethro, that I declined the invitation. I know she told all of you that. The part that really hurt was when I saw the look in Abby and Tim’s eyes when we were talking about it in the bullpen. They had figured out by that point that she had lied, and they didn’t care. Abby, I’m pretty sure she thought of it as a joke. But Tim… I could see the smug satisfaction in his eyes. I could tell he thought I deserved it. I could understand that you didn’t figure it out, your blind spot has always been women. But you should have realised that she had lied when she said I cut myself on a wooden crate. I had to go to the hospital that night, and get eight stitches on my arm. It wasn’t a scratch from wood, it was a bullet graze, a deep one.”  Tony sighed, and he could feel relief from finally releasing his feeling after all these years.

 

“I’m sorry…” Gibbs choked words were muffled into his chest, and Tony still found himself surprised at the man breaking rule six, a rule he apparently didn’t care about or believe in right now. 

 

“I know, Jethro, I know.” Tony pressed a kiss to the man's hair impulsively, and he just soothed and shushed the man when he jerked in shock, rubbing his back until he settled down again. 

 

“Ziva drew a divide between the team and me, she manipulated McGee, she played with your heart, and she drew Abby into her web. She had her claws into Jenny and her father had Vance by the balls. Mexico happened, and I really don’t blame you for it. Your brain had more holes then swiss cheese, and you had gone through trauma that would drop most people on their ass. They treated me like crap, Jethro, the whole time, subverting my authority, reminding me constantly I wasn’t you and to stop trying to be. The when I did, they complained that you would never do things the way I was doing them. By the time Jenny died, we rarely hung out, and when we did, I could feel the tension in the air. When Vance arrived and split us up… You never told me it wasn’t my fault that Jenny died, Jethro. It took me a long time to get over it, and when I did… the damage had been done. You took a long time to get me back, and yet, when I did get back, you barely acknowledged me. After that, there were no steak dinners, no nights with you in the basement. Didn’t have Christmas together anymore. Then you got shot. And things… broke.” Tony felt the tears begin anew on his already wet sweater, and pressed another kiss to the snowy hair, and squeezed the shaking shoulders.

 

“After I found out about Tali, it was the last straw. Jethro, I was drunk off my ass, when Tali was conceived. Ziva was sober. If I wasn’t drunk, Tali wouldn’t be here. I  _ never  _ would have slept with Ziva, and I never wanted to. I had no way to provide consent that night, and I would have said no if I was aware of what was happening. I was leaving the next day, and I really wouldn’t be surprised if she had dosed me with something. I can hold my drink pretty well, and I’ve never indulged enough to get that drunk before,” Tony could feel Jethro tensing again, and he sighed.

 

“She raped me that night, Jethro. I never consented to it, and when I left the next day, I had no plan on looking for Ziva again. I was done. When I found out that my rape resulted in a little girl, one that Ziva had kept from me for three years? I had to leave. It was too much, and it gave me the perfect excuse.”  Tony felt Gibbs wrap his arms around him, and squeeze. Tony was dismayed to feel that the man’s grip was, while not frail, was certainly far weaker then it should be. 

“Tony… If she wasn’t dead…” The voice, while still quiet at sad, had more then a hint of anger. 

 

“I know, Jet,” Tony felt Jethro’s lips smile slightly against his chest at the nickname.    

 

“Then you got shot. You pushed me away, you benched me, belittled me, and you ignored me when you weren’t busy doing that. I can only guess that you saw Shannon and Kelly while you were almost dead, like you did in your coma, and when you drowned.” He felt Gibbs nod into his chest. “I know that hurts, Jet, and I know you still love them, deeply. I know you blame yourself for what happened to them, for not being there. You never forgave yourself, and you let your guilt fester and you covered yourself in an impenetrable shell. I had started to break through that shell. I could see it. But Kate’s death built up a layer again. Mexico made it build a few more. Drowning made it concrete, and when you got shot in Iraq, it turned into a fortress.” He felt Jethro again nod into his chest, shuddering a breath. 

 

“All the progress I made was thrown out, and I really tried, I did. But you were hurt, and you didn’t want any help. So when the opportunity came to get away from a situation that was almost literally killing me, I took it. I ran, and I kept running for two years. A couple of months ago, Tali turned to me and asked if we were moving again,” Tony clenched his eyes shut, seeing the resigned look in his little girl’s eyes burned into his brain.

 

“It made me realise that I was hurting my daughter, my little girl. She didn’t deserve to be dragged around because her father was running away from his problems. So I told her we were moving for the last time, that the next place would be the last time we moved through the country. That we could stay in the country we landed on. She was so happy when I told her,” Tony smiled. “I told her about you, Jethro,” Gibbs looked up at him with wide, panicked eyes, and Tony held him tight when he started struggling. 

 

“Shhh, It’s ok, Jet,” Tony shushed the man, soothing him, kissing his temple until he calmed. “I only told her the good things, don’t worry. She even keeps a toy swiss army knife with her at all times, custom made. Rule nine, ya’ know.” Tony smiled. “She loves you without even meeting you, she loves her  _ dohd _ Jethro. Uncle Jethro.” Jethro smiled up at him, and Tony felt the last of his anger fade away.

 

“I forgave you a long time ago, Jet. I just had to stop running and come home.”

 

“Can I-” Jethro hesitated, nibbling on his lip, and Tony waited for him to speak. “Can I… Come home too, Tony?” Tony knew what he was asking, and kissing Jethro’s forehead, smiling.

 

“Of course Jet. You can come home.”

 

Tony didn’t know what the future would hold, and he would be working on Jethro’s health before exploring whatever relationship was budding between them,  but he was looking forward to it, and couldn’t wait to see Tali’s face Christmas morning, when she met Jethro.

 


End file.
